I am going on a 5 day (4 wheel drive) tour of the Tibetan Plateau tomorrow morning, visiting the more remote monasteries, the ancient hot springs (in the snow), sacred lakes, crossing the highest mountain passes and dropping into the Mount Everest Base camp on the way home…

It’s the end of the tourist season and many of the northern roads are already closed… If you get a map of Tibet, we will be traveling south west to Yamdrok-Tso Lake… then west through Gyantse, Shigatse and Sakya to the Nepalese border….

Its cold, particularly at night, I’m currently wearing fabulous red chinese thermal underwear, a black skivvy, long warm black pants, a large red woolen scarf, a thermal fleece timberland jacket (copy), a large woolen ‘maroon monk’s blanket’ (real), a purple gortex jacket (copy), wind proof ‘north face gloves (copy) and just in case it gets really cold I have one of those fabulous military green chinese hats with the brown fur that pull down to cover your ears…

Oh and two pairs of socks …

No real problems with altitude sickness, we are at 4,300 meters now, a bit of a headache and breathlessness if you ‘hurry’ or climb stairs but I have my ventalin (which I’m using several times a day) and we are buying small oxygen tanks to take to Everest base camp (5,300 meters) just in case …

Visiting the Potala Palace is quite a challenge, we made our first attempt the day before yesterday and were, however, refused entry, all allocated tickets for the day, had been sold, we were told… and no, they couldn’t sell us a ticket for tomorrow.

A cart piled with Yak butter and Cheese

A butcher prepares yak meat outside the Potala Palace

Sign hanging on the front door of the Potala Palace

Eventually after much animated charade type discussion we discovered that to obtain a ticket you must queue outside a small window located just inside the large wooden gate to the west of the Palace, then sometime after 11am each day a limited number of ‘tokens’ can be purchased (after passport and accommodation details are recorded). These tokens can then be exchanged for tickets to enter the Palace the following day!

And so today we got up very early and joined the pilgrimage, (our visit coincides with the Dali Lamas Birthday) walking slowly clockwise from the front of the massive façade, turning right past butchers preparing carcasses and wooden carts piled high with yak butter and cheese… young women sold juniper from brightly coloured cloth laid beside the cobbled paths. The circuit is intensely meditative, small handfuls of juniper sprinkled into each of the dozens of smoldering alcoves in the palace wall, a thoughtful turning of each of the hundreds of prayer wheels lining the route.

And finally hours later, through the massive wooden doors, draped in prayer flags and silk scarves and up the steep stone steps to the Palace itself, I loved the golden rooms – the morning sun streaming into rooms painted saffron orange (where the Dali Lama used to met with ‘heads of state’ until 1956) and the opulent tombs of the 5th, 6th and 7th Dali Lamas (solid gold, studded with turquoise, coral and pearls towering above you… I was really surprised they were so ‘intact’).

Surrounded by a steady stream of pilgrims clutching all manner of containers, tins, bottles, plastic carefully spooned yak butter onto candles and pushed crumpled notes through wire and draped white silk scarves across the laps of the various Buddha incarnations…

I joined the pilgrimage this morning walking clockwise around Jokhang Temple (the most significant Buddhist temple in the world) in a crush with hundreds of ethnic Tibetans, dressed in furs and embroidered multi coloured cloth, hair adorned with silver and coral and turquoise, handheld prayer wheels twirling … the smell of ‘yak’ was pervasive… the level of profound belief moved me to tears… I burn a little offering in a large white stupor (a fisherman’s friend packet) it seemed like the perfect place to do it…

Then we are ‘inside’ the temple, past the dozens of pilgrims prostrating themselves, a slow circuit around the long courtyard, turning each of the large prayer wheels, wooden handles worn and black with yak grease, the Chinese guards ‘herd’ us into the main temple with wooden sticks… the crush and smell is almost overwhelming, small children hold my legs, old women smile and nod as they spoon yak butter onto candles in each of the small dark alcoves… we shuffle forward, climbing through ancient wooden doorways, a monk chats on his mobile…

Outside in the Barkhor, it’s about 2 degrees and trying to snow…

View west across the Jokhang Temple courtyard towards the Potala Palace in Lhasa, Tibet

A young buddhist monk running around the roof of the Jokhang Temple, Lhasa Tibet

Tibetan Pilgrims in the Barkhor area surrounding the Jokhang Temple, Lhasa Tibet

The train was breathtaking… all 47 hours across 4,000 km’s … my travel companion, Mr Wang, woke me periodically through the night(s) to draw my attention to potential ‘photographic opportunities’… whispering ‘Moon’ or ‘Yak’ as he shook my shoulder… we would then both enjoy the glorious light on the snow, or shadowy herds as we passed across the vast plateau…

The new train has been running for three weeks and it wasn’t too difficult to get a Tibet Tourism Permit (TTP) to visit the ‘newly liberated autonomous region of Tibet’… two days negotiating with shonky tour operators in Xi’an and then a long wait at the railway station to buy train tickets…. Finally we passed through the police check point at the station and boarded the train… modern and clean, with bi lingual broadcasts informing us about the topography, the great feats of engineering and the issues associated with high altitudes…

“Ladies and gentlemen (the announcement crooned) smoking is really really bad for your health”… as a prelude to warning that the train would be ‘pressurized’ with pure oxygen as we crossed the highest mountain passes (Tanggula Pass, at 5,072 m above sea level the world’s highest rail track)… a soft hiss emitted from the many outlets as the oxygen was turned on…

The train slows to 120 km per hour when it reaches the Qinghai-Tibet section more than 960 km, or over 80% of the railway, is at an altitude of more than 4,000 m. There are 675 bridges, totaling 159.88 km, and over half the length of the railway is laid on permafrost.

From my window I marvel at the engineering feat which involved millions of rocks being placed on their sides in large diamond patterns, to shade the soil and prevent the permafrost from melting… and the kilometers of large steel posts containing special ‘freezing’ chemicals buried deep in the earth beside the tracks…

Tent on the Tibetan Plateau

Millions of stones piled up to create ‘shade’ and stop the permafrost from melting along the route of the Beijing to Lhasa Railway

Tibetan Pilgrams wave at the Quinghai Tibet Railway Train

Tibetan Village on the Quinghai Tibet Plateau

The Tibetan villages have squarish houses made from rammed earth or mud bricks, large perimeter walls surround animal enclosures and racks for drying grasses and stock feed… and the train track is lined with shepherds or families … looking in wonder and occasionally waving at the train… across the vast plains in the most remote areas you still see someone, off in the distance moving stock, the landscape is never completely empty…

I’m here just in time as the Chinese government plans to increase trains to 8 a day each way…. opening up the country to new technology and innovation (you understand the benefits of liberation) … a bitter sweet feeling of exhilaration and dread as you recall the icy creeks downstream from the villages beginning to ‘clog’ with plastic waste and observe the first changes as a countries values move from a spiritual to an economic base….

Catherine is the founding Director of Cultural Partnerships Australia established in 2010 and has held the position of Director Special Projects at Red Gate Gallery since 2009. She is a member of the prestigious International Association … [Read More...]

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